The "General Belgrano"

HL Deb 28 March 1984 vol 450 cc225-7

Lord Hatch of Lusby

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper.

The Question was as follows: To ask Her Majesty's Government why the Ministry of Defence refused to supply the authors of the book The Sinking of the Belgrano with answers to questions put by them to Admiral Woodward.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Armed Forces (Lord Trefgarne)

My Lords, the circumstances of the sinking of the "General Belgrano" have been explained in this House and in another place, and the request for an interview was accordingly declined.

Lord Hatch of Lusby

My Lords, I understand from the book that an interview actually took place but that the answers at that interview were suppressed by the Minister of State at the Ministry of Defence. Is it the case, as is stated in this new book, that HMS "Conqueror" had been tracking the "General Belgrano" for 25 hours, including a period of refuelling, before it was attacked? Is it also the case that a message ordering the "General Belgrano" to return to home port was decoded by GCHQ at Cheltenham? Did Admiral Woodward have such information, if this is true, and was this the reason why the Ministry of Defence suppressed the answers which he gave to the authors of the book?

Lord Trefgarne

No, my Lords. The answers to the questions which the authors wanted to put to Admiral Woodward had been given to your Lordships and to the other place on a number of occasions, particularly on 13th July of last year, when my noble friend Lady Young answered an Unstarred Question from the noble Lord. The matters which the noble Lord now puts to me are generally of a confidential, security nature and cannot therefore be revealed.

Lord Lewin

My Lords, in their book the authors state that in addition to Admiral Woodward they asked the questions of the commanding officer of HMS "Conqueror" and me. Is the Minister aware that, although they were told by the Ministry that I was no longer serving and that they should approach me directly, this they did not do? Would the Minister agree that this is perhaps a pity, because then I could have cleared up some of the many misunderstandings which the book contains?

Lord Trefgarne

My Lords, I am interested to hear that the authors did not approach the noble and gallant Lord As he has said, he was not serving at the time that they put their questions It was not, therefore, a question of whether or not the Ministry of Defence should approve such an approach

Lord Annan

My Lords, has the noble Lord by any chance read a review of this book in The Times Literary Supplement of 9th March by Professor Freedman, who is Professor of War Studies at King's College, London, which would establish in the mind of any reasonable person that the sinking of the "General Belgrano" was in no way and could not have been connected with any Peruvian peace initiative? Is the noble Lord also aware that the authors of the book show no sign of understanding how naval intelligence is collected, enciphered, deciphered disseminated, collated, evaluated and finally brought to bear upon naval operations, which are accordingly modified or reinforced in the light of that information? Finally, would the noble Lord agree that the real issue at stake is that, just as after the Battle of Jutland the German high seas fleet never again put to sea and remained thereafter in German ports, so in this case the sinking of the "General Belgrano" meant that the Argentine navy remained in port during the whole of the operations of the task force? Is not that the most important point to remember?

Lord Trefgarne

My Lords, I agree entirely with the noble Lord It is, I must say, a rather bad book I should also say, with regard to the Peruvian proposals, that they were not received in London until some hours after the "General Belgrano" was sunk.

Lord Hatch of Lusby

My Lords, will the noble Lord answer the first two questions which I asked him in my first supplementary? Is it the case that HMS "Conqueror" tracked the "General Belgrano" for 25 hours before she was attacked, and is it the case that a message ordering the "General Belgrano" back to port was decoded at GCHQ in Cheltenham? Will the noble Lord also say why the "General Belgrano" was attacked on 2nd May if she was being tracked and was refuelling on 1st May? And, why was it that neither of her escorts, which I believe were loaded with Exocets, was attacked at the same time?

The Earl of Lauderdale

They ran away.

Lord Trefgarne

My Lords, turning to the last of the noble Lord's supplementaries, as he knows, the "General Belgrano" was assessed as offering a threat to certain units of the task force Clearly, as somebody behind me has just commented, the escorts could not have posed the same threat since they turned tail and fled the moment the "General Belgrano" was sunk.

Lord Hatch of Lusby

My Lords, would the noble Lord answer the questions which I asked?

Lord Trefgarne

My Lords, the other questions which the noble Lord has put to me are, I am afraid, confidential matters relating to security which are never discussed.

Lord Mackie of Benshie

My Lords, would it not be reasonable for the noble Lord to say whether or not the destroyers escorting the "General Belgrano" were armed with Exocet missiles?

Lord Trefgarne

My Lords, I have seen reports that they were.